


Step Off Into Whiteness

by ellen_fremedon



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: Astronomy, Interspecies, M/M, Mind Rape, pre-HBP
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-04-29
Updated: 2004-04-29
Packaged: 2017-10-02 02:28:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellen_fremedon/pseuds/ellen_fremedon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Firenze adapts to exile. Dumbledore takes in a new stray.  Snape doesn't save anyone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Step Off Into Whiteness

**Author's Note:**

> This story is a remix of Juxian Tang's [](http:)"Gross Infringement," written for the [Remix Redux](http://remix.illuminatedtext.com/dbarchive.php) challenge.  
> 
> 
> Naked-eye astronomical details are as accurate as I and the Edmund Scientific Co. Star and Planet Locator could make them (I am a huge geek). Minute variations in luminosity, however, are entirely made up (I am also lazy). The title is from Sylvia Plath's "Sheep in Fog." Thanks to Fox, Erica, and Delphi for beta.

_i.) ghosts_

The Death Eaters have all gone to ground; the Order is scattered in pursuit. All but Snape-- his masters want him close. Albus tells him so, and the Dark Lord's absence is a constant ache in his arm. It pains him this night; he tosses in his bed and stares at his walls, at the green hangings and the bare stones between them.

The summer of the Dark Lord's return, he never noticed his dungeon rooms; never saw them except to sleep, short hours snatched between one secret summons and the next. Not so this summer. The watchfulness he fell into as Umbridge tightened her hold has not left him, now she has quit the castle, and Severus wakes long before morning, feeling the dungeon walls crowd close about him: they are cold, and the ghosts leave gleaming tracks through them like the wakes of snails.

Perhaps the castle wants him wakeful, wants them all awake. Lights burn all night in Albus's tower; Filch and his cat walk new grooves into the flags; Aurors and thieves and spies come and go on Order business all night and day. On the lawns before the great doors, Firenze stands scanning the sky, even on nights of cloud and fog, from dusk until dawn and into the brightness of day. He stands there now, as Severus rises and blows the dust from his collecting gear-- insect nets and kill jars, stoppered glass vials, mesh bags, pruning knives in silver and cold iron, all stowed in their particular pockets-- and sets out into the Forbidden Forest.

Firenze has not spoken to Severus since coming to the castle-- they neither of them bother with pleasantries, and there's been occasion for nothing else. He doesn't speak tonight, doesn't call out to him. But he watches, as Severus leaves his own silver snail-track through the dewy grass; and when Severus steps out from the eaves of the forest, hours after dawn, Firenze is still standing before the doors, still watching.

* * *

_ii.) rebuke_

Albus deals absolution as the Dark Lord deals Cruciatus: liberally and impartially over the whole circle, smiling, secure in the knowledge that he is loved, and deservedly so. And never doubting but that his followers will dry their streaming eyes (only Lupin's are dry as Severus's own, dry and red and sunken) and rise, and go and do his will.

And they do, the Order scattering down the stairs and into the world, into danger, but Albus holds Severus back. "A moment, if you would."

_(Dumbledore was angry, but not angry enough, and Severus looked away so he would not have to see him smiling at Potter and Black. Better to let his eyes range over the clutter-- a microscope, a sextant, a crucible, a compass-- and let the names drown out Dumbledore's indulgent voice. When the Gryffindors were finally sent away, Severus's hands began to shake again, and wouldn't stop until he curled them into fists.)_

"Severus," Albus says, shaking his head, "I charged you to teach Harry Occlumency." He flutters one hand over Severus's sleeve; Severus shakes it off violently.

"No, Albus. You are not going to turn this into my failing."

Albus sighs. "I know that you were not the only architect of last night's disaster, Severus. Far from it. But--"

"But I'm convenient."

Albus's eye gleams for a moment, but he damps the spark as soon as it flares. "Severus. You know I don't wish to lay blame--"

"I know. And there's a limit to how much of your forgiveness I can take."

_("Severus. Look at me, Severus." He saw pity in Dumbledore's eyes, and looked away almost at once. A telescope. An easel. Fawkes asleep on his perch. A half-rotted shield on a stand, its gold boss and rim bright against decaying leather, and a sword belt, heavy with white gems the size of phoenix eggs._

"You know that I must rely on your silence in this matter, Severus."  
The sword hilt is studded with rubies; on the blade, neat uncials trace Godric Gryffindor's name. "Mr. Snape? Can I count on you to keep what you have seen tonight to yourself?"

Severus dared one more look. "Yes, Headmaster. You can count on me.")

"I know perfectly well, Albus, what poor judgment I have shown. And on that score you have no right to chastise me, none at all!"

Albus looks at him-- for once, his gaze is even, not battering at his thoughts, not twinkling in dismissal. "I am not accustomed to being challenged so openly in my own office, Severus."

There's a moment that Severus knows is his only chance to apologize, but he lets it pass in silence.

"I think..." Albus says. "If I were, things might not have gone so ill." Severus almost doesn't recognize Albus's expression as a smile, with his eyes so still. "Don't stop challenging me, my friend."

* * *

_iii.) hoofbeats_

Severus hears the silence first: the ragged echoes of the last bird's cry hang in the air, as if caught between the droplets of fog. Then come the hoofbeats. They, too, slow and catch in the heavy air, but the earth beneath Severus's knees tolls with each ringing stroke.

Last summer, he would have risen from the bed of fern, would have called out, followed. Centaurs are no masters of herblore, but nothing happens in their forest, not to the falling of a leaf, that they do not see and mark, even if they cannot read it rightly. Always before, the centaurs have been willing to share that knowledge with him: Severus is a proud man, and centaurs respect pride.

Last summer, Firenze would have dropped back from the herd, told him that the boomslangs were molting, and where toadstools had sprung and doxiewort was sprouting. The herd would have moved on, Ronan and Magorian stamping the ground impatiently, until the white centaur-- Severus has never heard his name-- finally turned, and wove back through the gleaming bodies, chestnut and dapple and black, and inclined his bearded head in response to Severus's deep bow. Firenze would have called him Professor, but the white centaur would have stroked his white beard and called him Loremaster, and made him free of the forest and its fruits.

Last summer, but not this one. Now, Severus slowly straightens, where he kneels in the bracken, and listens to the hoofbeats. They are faint, baffled by the fog and deadened in the thick leaf litter, but they grow louder, closer-- and then circle, widdershins about him, the earth shuddering with each heavy footfall. The fog ripples; in the early light Severus sees nothing but grey, but he knows that just beyond his sight, the air is thick with glossy flanks and whipping tails, the ground churning under flashing hooves.

Severus doesn't count his heartbeats, or the wide circuits the herd beats around his glade of ferns. The light has gone from grey to gold when at last the wide circle unwinds, straightens, collapsing from a ring to a line to a slowly-retreating point, the rumor of hooves fading to a low thrum in the earth, a sound Severus feels more than hears.

Severus's pulse is loud in his ears. It, too, fades to a murmur before the birds take voice again.

* * *

_iv.) stargazing by day_

"Will you watch the stars with me?"

It's brilliant morning, the sun so bright on the centaur's white-blond hair and white-sharp teeth that Severus can't help but squint. But Firenze just laughs at his puzzlement and leads him inside, shuts the sun out of his classroom, and the stars are there. Winter stars: Severus turns to the south, from long habit seeking the Serpent-bearer, but Orion towers in his place.

_("He sets," Lucius hissed, his breath cold in Severus's ear, his chin sharp against his shoulder. "And we rise." He spun them around to the east, where Ophiuchus stood upon the horizon. "The rest of this rabble is nothing-- dead beasts and dead heroes and the lovers of dead gods. The Serpent-bearer conquered death, Severus." Lucius's left hand slid down Severus's sleeve and circled his wrist tightly. His thumb slipped under Severus's glove, traced small circles against his skin. Severus could feel a prickle of magic in the touch, Lucius's own, and another power behind his-- vaster, deeper, implacable. "Even the gods feared him.")_

This is the day sky, thinks Severus. The sky they would see outside, if the sun went out, or if their eyes could pierce its haze: Orion low in the south, and Bellatrix and Sirius glowering at each other across the warrior's body.

But it's Draco that Firenze has brought him here to see. The dragon twists through the northern sky, coiling his tail about the Pole as around a hoard of gems.

Firenze looks down at Severus and nods. "You see it, then, Professor. Good."

Severus doesn't ask what he's supposed to be seeing. All seers are showmen and hucksters; the centaur will explain.

Firenze looks down at him for a long moment, studying him. "He holds tight to direction," he says at last, "so tight he can move only in circles," and Severus realizes they're talking about the present.

When Firenze lets the sunlight back in, there's still a look of judgement in his face. "Watch with me this night as well. There is still half the sky to consider." He pauses, his hands on the window sash and his tail switching. "If you will, of course." He inclines his head, gravely, as to an equal; and Severus, to his surprise, says "Of course."

* * *

_v.) Pensieve_

Albus gives him a gift: a Pensieve. It's not as deep as his own-- Severus has not so many memories as Albus-- and the magic is not laid so thickly upon it, but it's richly made: polished hematite, black and heavy and smooth.

And empty. It sits on his desk, the smoke within settled to mirror stillness, waiting for him to pour his mind into it. It's too rich a gift for him.

Smoke and mirrors. Severus learned long ago to see through them-- the twinkling eye, the indulgent smile, the restless hand that never quite alighted on shoulder or sleeve-- and thought himself wise for it. Wise, and then worldly, when he'd won knowledge of other arts-- first Lucius's gracious drawl and the languid precision of his hands; later, the Dark Lord's heavy, unblinking stare, his casual largesse and studied violence.

He knows better now. A wise man's gut wouldn't still twist with desire watching Lucius's lip curl at some private amusement. A wise man might mask duplicity beneath his remembered love for his old master, even well enough to look into his red eyes and betray nothing else-- but he would not shake with the pain of letting that love fall away again.

And a wise man would not let such a gift sit unused, not a ripple or a whorl marring the heavy smoke. But Severus knows he is not wise.

And Albus is less artful-- with him, only with him-- than he has ever been. The gift itself, of course, is shrewdly given: Severus knows that to accept is to agree to resume Potter's training, and if the Pensieve is too rich a gift for him to accept, it's too rich by far to refuse.

But when Albus gives it, there are no jokes and no sherbet lemons, no fluttering of his crimson sleeves. When, days later, he asks Severus if he's used it, he asks bluntly, with none of his usual periphrasis.

"No." Impossible not to meet plainness with plainness.

Albus sets down his teacup-- a month ago, he would have fussed with the spoon, mixing in sugar as though stirring a cauldron, waiting for Severus to utter apologies or promises-- and folds his hands in his lap. "Will you?"

It's too great a gift to refuse. "When I begin training Potter again, I will."

Albus draws a breath, but cuts off his own answer with a nod. "That will do, I suppose. I had hoped--" He shakes his head, smiles sadly. "No. You will do as you will; I have no right to tell how to deal with your own memories." He stands up-- straighter than usual, shrugging off years with the stoop of his shoulders-- and looks down into Severus's eyes. "But I am telling you to deal with them, Severus. However you must."

There's no pressure from his mind-- Albus needs no Legilimency for this-- but he's not hiding any of his power. It's as though he's stepped out of the shade, into cold daylight.

Severus thinks he should be intimidated, but he can feel no fear-- only a strange tenderness, that Albus trusts him enough to be so honest. He nods, the only answer he can make with equal honesty.

Albus smiles-- this time, perhaps, is there the smallest glint in his eye?-- and lays his hand over Severus's. His skin is like rice paper. "It grieves me to see you overmastered by anyone, Severus, but most especially by the frightened boy you once were. I do wish you would not give him such power over you."

Later, when he thinks back on this conversation, Severus cannot recall whether Albus said _anyone_, or _anyone else_. The Pensieve sits on his desk; he stares into the glassy surface of the smoke for a long time, but he does not disturb its stillness.

* * *

_vi.) stargazing at night_

Firenze's astrology is all in subtleties too fine for Severus's eyes: cycles of bright and dark, shifts in color, in stars that to Severus burn a constant and unwavering white. He looks where the centaur points, but it's like reading meaning in the typeface of a familiar text: however he stares at serifs and ligatures, all he can see are the words. The Northern Crown hangs above the Serpent's Head; the Archer rides behind the Serpent-bearer with drawn bow.

Severus sees what he knows how to see. But he comes back, every clear night, and keeps looking.

"Have you observed the Dragon's eyes tonight, Professor?" Severus looks to the north. Rastaban and Eltanin are gold and bright, twinkling a little, no different than on any other mild summer night.

"What should I see in them?" Severus never calls Firenze by name or by his new title, but the centaur's careful courtesy to him stays unchanged.

"They shift. They glance one way and the other."

"It hardly takes Divination to suppose that Draco is considering his options, with Lucius still in Azkaban."

Firenze nods gravely. "No. But observe now the Dragon's heart."

Severus follows the coils down to Thuban, but sees only steady white; not even a flicker shows to his eyes.

"I see nothing," he says.

Firenze only nods again, white glinting off his coat and hair. "Did you ever doubt your course, Professor?"

Firenze knows every step of that course now, after a month of constant interrogation. His questions would be brazen, impudent, if they were not so impersonal, but Firenze has not yet uttered a word even of sympathy, much less of judgment; and so Severus answers, every time.

"No. Not at first." At first there was only anger, transmuted into fierce love under the Dark Lord's eyes, or Lucius's touch, but never quenched. Doubt had only crept in later, seeping in to the empty places where his rage had burned out. "I never doubted; I never imagined there was another choice I could make. It was clear enough which side appreciated me, and I was certain that I'd never be wanted anywhere else."

"But you were mistaken."

"No." Beside him, the centaur's body stills. "But that... wasn't reason enough to damn myself so thoroughly."

Firenze's flanks rise and fall with one breath, then another, and then he turns his head to follow the scudding of a high cirrus cloud. "I am not convinced that you are correct, Professor," he says at last. "Though if you are..." He scuffs at the ground with one polished hoof. "I face an exile not unlike yours. Perhaps I only wish to believe that you are wrong, that there may yet be fellowship or respect for me here."

Firenze is too proud to ask for comfort, and Severus will not offer it unbidden. That pride, he understands well. But he looks away for a moment, giving the centaur what distance he can.

The clouds are blowing in thicker, massing on the horizon; it will be a grey morning. Severus looks back to Draco, still showing clear in the northern skies. "What should I see, in the dragon's heart?"

Firenze looks down sharply. "You do not perceive?" He presses up close behind him, planting his hooves to either side of Severus's feet. "Here," he says, and takes Severus's face in his hand, tilts his chin a fraction. Human hand, human-warm, but with a more-than-human strength in it; Severus could not look away from Thuban's glare, even if he were not frozen by the centaur's presence, by his breath blowing down over his ear. "Do not move your gaze. Look steadily, and do not blink." The star, too, seems frozen, staring back unblinking, even as Severus's gaze narrows until it fills his whole sky. There's nothing but cold whiteness and the warm, implacable strength of Firenze's hand against his cheek. "Now," he says, "what do you see?"

"Nothing," Severus says. "It doesn't flicker, it doesn't fade. Nothing changes."

Firenze releases him, steps away; the night air is suddenly cold on his back. "Yes, you see it," he says. "The dragon's head still wavers, but his heart is settled."

"On what course?" he asks. No answer comes. He looks up at Firenze; the centaur shakes his head. "You will learn that before I will." Firenze is still studying him gravely, his gaze as still as the star's, and in the starlight almost as pale. "There is much you will learn. I am certain of it..." He reaches out again to lift Severus's chin, turn his face slightly, this way and that, as if he can read the future on Severus's skin, or in the eyes that he does not dare close. When he pulls away, his fingers trail softly down Severus's throat, before he lets them fall.

"What do you see?" Severus asks, before he can stop the words.

"I am a poor seer." Firenze's voice is almost sad. "And some signs I have not the skill to read."

* * *

_vii.) summer _

Severus seldom dreams in winter, and when he does, his dreams are just scraps of his winter days, torn up and spun together. Nothing he remembers; nothing that colors his days. But the summer is different.

In late July, between one night and the next, the summer's heat reaches the dungeons. Severus sleeps that night without waking, though his sleep is fitful and light; when he wakes in the morning, his sheets are tangled and damp with sweat, and the half-remembered ends of his dreams wheel through his mind. Summer dreams: they leave his heart racing, his limbs heavy and tingling with pins and needles. Under the Mark is a yearning pain. His prick is hard, and his skin feels every stirring of the steamy air.

In the shade of the forest, it's cool, but deadly still. Nothing moves; even the air drowses, slow and heavy. Severus's eyes, too, are heavy; the dreams that rode him still clutch at him. He shakes his head, trying to throw off the last of his sleep, but the movement only dizzies him-- against the stillness, his smallest motion seems immense, every footstep a running leap, and he's breathing hard.

He feels the hoofbeats before he hears them, this time: a pulse, just out of step with his heartbeat; a stutter under his feet.

They grow louder, and then wane, come nearer, and retreat; they gallop, tumultuous, untouched by the languor of the air. A wind follows them: no breath of it touches him, but Severus can see leaves twisting in mid-fall, can see ferns swaying; only that, and perhaps, in the far distance, the gleam of white coats and shining hooves.

When at last they vanish among the trees, only the heaviness of Severus's feet stops him from following, as the wind follows, seeking the coolness at the heart of the wood.

The castle is dark and cool, but just as still; no wind blows through the empty corridors, or beats against the hanging banners. But Albus's purple sleeves flutter, and his voice rings. "Severus. You seem abstracted." His eyes take in the net bag of mushrooms, the jar of leeches, the tied bundles of leaf and vine. "Ah. I see.

"Severus..." Albus falls into step with him, robes sweeping behind him on the dungeon stairs. "The forest is a dangerous place."

"It always has been, Albus. It will no doubt continue to be." Severus unloads his burdens onto his worktable. "And I will continue to need materials." He can feel his face burning. He looks down at his hands, begins sorting the bundled herbage-- lichen-mottled bark from the north side of a dead oak, faggot of twigs from same; bark from a living tree, north side, east side, west-- but Albus's hand covers his, halting him. He looks up; Albus is smiling, but it's a rueful smile, sad. "I do not doubt your fortitude, Severus, and I am not patronizing you." Albus doesn't let go. "But I do worry."

"I know." Albus's fingers brush his wrist, and Severus knows he won't let go until he feels his heart slow. "I can take care of myself," he says, quietly.

"I have never doubted that you can." Albus releases him; but his hand hovers, not an inch above Severus's own, close enough to feel its heat. "But I do wish..." He smiles tightly, tucks his hands into his sleeves. "Well. No matter. Do as you think best, Severus; I have trusted your judgment in weightier matters than this."

Firenze's caution, when it comes, is more stern. "The centaurs have had their revenge against the woman, but they will deal no less severely with the next human to injure their pride, or threaten their sovereignty. And they consider trespass just such an injury, and such a threat. I should not like to see you suffer their wrath, Professor. You perhaps least of all."

* * *

_viii.) asylum_

The night Draco comes, the sky is busy with meteors. He might almost be taken for one, pale boy on a polished broom, did he not fly across their stream, speeding up from the south and into Perseus's arms. Severus knows his house's Seeker, even flying headlong and blind, and he's on his feet before the boy lands, running down the slope as Draco picks himself up. Firenze watches, but does not follow.

"Draco." The boy quivers, standing on legs knotted from long flight-- and how long has he flown? His hair is windblown and stiff with dust. "What's the matter?"

Draco looks up sharply, though in the dimness Severus cannot read his face. "My father. He-- they're just leaving him there."

He has no idea, he realizes, what Draco knows of him. What Draco believes him to be. Draco shoulders his broom, stumbling minutely, and Severus falls into step close at side. "Legal matters take time to resolve," he says. "Your father's hearing isn't scheduled to begin until--"

"It's not about the hearing." Draco swallows, brushes a strand of pale hair out of his eyes. "I heard my aunt tell my mother." He stops and looks up into Severus's face, searching for some sign of recognition. "Do you know my aunt?"

"We have moved in some of the same... circles." Draco lets out a breath, though his shoulders are still drawn up high and tight. "Go on."

"She says he's _safer_ there! She said it was the best place to keep him, until he's _needed_." His voice almost breaks on the last word. "She says the-- the Dementors won't come near him. Unless they're ordered to."

They stop in a square of light cast from the entrance hall windows. Draco looks up at him, silent, but his question-- how could you let this happen?-- is naked in his face.

If Severus allows that he is powerless in this, he will lose the boy's confidence; disastrous, if Draco has come seeking his father's associate, Snape the Death Eater. But if he pretends to an influence he does not have, he'll lose the boy's trust-- a disaster in any circumstances.

Draco's pale eyes are wide open, shining under the long-thrown torchlight; his hands are white on the broomstick. Maybe he's only come to see his head of house; maybe it's comfort he most needs. But the Dark Lord has left Lucius to rot in Azkaban, Albus will gladly see him stay there, and Draco brings nothing to bargain with; the comfort he craves would be only lies and empty promises.

Or perhaps not. "Draco." He lays his hand on the boy's shoulder, a gentle weight against the tension there, like pressing a sounding drumhead into silence. "Your father knew it might come to this, when he made the choices he did. It's not too late for you to choose differently--"

"To choose new friends? Who won't abandon me? Is that what you mean?" Draco wrenches away, throwing off Severus's touch. He squares his shoulders, tightening his hold on his broom. "I'm here to talk to Professor Dumbledore."

And as if summoned by his name, the man appears, throwing open the great doors. Severus doesn't hear how he greets Draco, or what the boy says to him: there is a roar in his ears, like the rush of a smothered ember blown to flame. He watches the boy climb into the yellow-lit doorway, starlight and torchlight mingling over his hair, until Albus gathers the boy into the fold of one dark-robed arm and shuts the doors behind them. The square of light on the grass flickers, bright to dim to bright, as they pass before the torches on their way up the stairs.

After a moment, Severus hears Firenze's hoofbeats behind him. The centaur's white face is lit gold in the glow of the hall; behind him, the flashing sky is faded, the stars bleached and watery. "Well?" Severus brushes past him, not waiting for him to follow. "There's no use standing in the light."

* * *

_ix.) morning breaks_

Lamps still burn in Albus's tower; Severus looks up, and wonders that he did not feel the window's eye upon him. He stares back, boldly, knowing the dawn is near enough to betray them to any watching eyes-- his booted leg thrown over Firenze's knee, his head in the crook of Firenze's arm. Firenze's hand, lying open against Severus's chest; his head nodding on his shoulder, his lips almost touching Severus's hair.

For all his boldness, Severus knows the tower's yellow eye is blind. Albus's gaze will be fixed inward, not outward-- on Draco's grey eyes, and on what he can see behind them. Severus and Firenze were not watched this night.

_(Severus stumbles down the hill into the dark, ignoring Firenze's calls, but the centaur follows-- and in a sudden rush of hooves, he is before him, kneeling down, searching his face. "Severus." Firenze's pale brow is furrowed in confusion. "What you suffered, he at least will be spared."_

"Is that what the skies tell you?" Severus scoffs, trying to look away, though Firenze is so near he can turn his eyes nowhere without seeing his pale arms, the flash of stars against his hair.

Firenze seizes his chin and holds his face until Severus meets his gaze. "You are angry."

Severus shuts his eyes, tries to twist out of the centaur's grip, but Firenze does not let go, not until Severus rasps "I should be the one to save him."

Even through closed eyes, Severus feels the centaur's stare, warm against his face-- feels the rush of sudden comprehension as a rising flush in his cheek. But when he looks again, there's no pity in Firenze's level blue gaze, and no judgment; and in the sudden release of long-held breath, Severus is leaning into the centaur's strong hand.)

Firenze still nods, but Severus has not slept. Aches are beginning to knot in his neck and legs, and his robes are damp with dew, save for where his back is pressed to Firenze's broad chest. He should get up. He should wake Firenze. He should return to his rooms, wait on Albus's inevitable summons.

Firenze stirs in his sleep, muttering against Severus's hair. Severus turns his head, slow, careful not to wake him, and looks up into the centaur's face. Asleep, he looks both older and younger; with the shocking blue of his eyes hidden, he has no color but what the dawn gives him, faint washes of rose and gold over flawless marble.

He is exquisite.

Severus would feel it, if Albus looked down from his window. He would feel it, but he thinks he would not flinch. He would look back, stare for stare. He is sure that Albus would look away first-- maybe to glance sharply down, to compose his features before turning back to Draco's glass-grey eyes; or maybe with a quiet nod, a steady, untwinkling smile that he will not hide. But he would look away first.

And for his part, Severus almost wishes-- almost-- to see that flicker at the window, to know that they are seen. But Firenze's pride is no less than his, and Severus looks away from the tower's light, lest Albus should feel the weight of his own stare. Surely, if Firenze knew how high the sun had climbed, he would not still clasp Severus to his chest. Surely he would not hold him so, in the light of day.

Slowly, very slowly, he untangles his limbs from Firenze's, pulls away from the centaur's embrace. Firenze shivers, blows out a whickering breath between his _(soft, soft)_ sculpted lips, but he does not wake.

Behind the jagged line of the forest, the sky is bright and shell-pale; the castle's towers catch the sun, daylight slowly pouring down the stone and flaring the gold-lit windows to a brighter gold. For a moment, Severus looks up the slope: his collecting gear is in the castle; and soon, Albus will call for him. And soon, Firenze will wake.

The sunlight flares on Albus's window, and Severus turns and heads into the forest. He has his wand; he needs no other gear. And anyone who might want him knows where to find him.

* * *

_x.) et in arcadia_

"You were warned that we would not deal softly with trespassers."

Severus cradles his broken wrist, looks up at the chestnut centaur who holds his wand. There had been no hoofbeats-- only a deepening silence, the break and rustle of Severus's footfalls sounding louder and louder, until he broke into the clearing and saw the centaurs: forty at least, closer to the forest's edge than they've ventured all summer.

"We told Dumbledore we would tolerate no more incursions, but still you came, and we did nothing. But this!" Magorian's face is stony, but shivers of rage ripple across his glossy coat. "Did you think you could insult us, you and the traitor, with this-- this abomination?" He stamps one heavy, black-fringed foot. "Did you think you would not be _watched_?"

And they close in-- Bane glowering down at him, and Ronan sighing sadly. And, weaving his way to the center of the circle, the white centaur with his long beard. He has Firenze's eyes.

"It is ill enough for the traitor Firenze to share our secret lore with you, to bend his back to you like a common mule, though you humans think it no less than your due. But even from your beasts of burden you do not demand such--" he shakes his white head-- "such service." And Severus is on his back before he feels the kick.

After that, he cannot count the blows.

After a time, a voice cuts the though the pounding of the hooves, and then naked arms are hauling him up by his robes, holding him up, his feet dragging the ground.

"No," the voice is saying, "we won't kill him." Chestnut and black, behind a red haze; there's blood dripping into his eyes. "We will do to him as we did to the woman, since it is clear that our first message went unheeded." Severus blinks back the red: Bane drops his arrow from the string; Magorian turns to the white centaur. "It is for you to do."

He nods gravely, and the other centaurs step back, save for the two who hold Severus between them. The old centaur raises one knotted hand and lifts Severus's chin, studies his face from every angle. And then with a sudden gleam of blue, it begins.

This is not Legilimency-- or if it is, it's nothing like the art Severus has learned. He is in the memory and out of it, seeing at once the disgust in the centaurs' faces, and the wonder in Firenze's, as his hands slip under Severus's robes and slowly, slowly, trace the lines of his legs. _("Amazing," he breathed, against Severus's hair, "amazing." His voice quavered; he sounded suddenly very young._

Low on his belly, smooth skin gave way to even smoother hair: the golden coat was soft beneath Severus's fingers, turning coarse when he stroked against the grain. He tried to press closer, press skin-- his robes hung open-- to smooth hide, but Firenze held him back. "No. Let me look, first. Let me touch." Severus's heartbeat hammered in his ears, loud, a steady, rapid clip-clop, clip-clop. There was such open longing in Firenze's voice, and in his face-- from his face-- he narrows his blue eyes, and in the old centaur's voice, he spits, "Abomination.")

Wildly, Severus opens his eyes: the centaurs are circling them at a gallop, a whirl of gleaming bodies and tossing hair, and dust and earth flying beneath their cruel feet.

The sound of their hooves never lets up; its wild beat thunders under every memory the old one's eyes turn up, as though Severus has heard it all his life. He will never stop hearing it, he thinks.

No, nor ever see a face without looking for the white centaur's blue eyes behind it. Firenze, Draco, Lucius, Albus-- one by one their faces shift; they look at him with eyes not their own.

_(Severus was nineteen, and he'd learned the price of his welcome.)_

After a time, Severus looks for the shift in every face.

_(He stood aggressively straight when Dumbledore shooed the others out of his office, not letting himself tremble against the hand on his shoulder, but ready to drop to his knees the moment he felt it press him, the moment the touch became a command.)_

He doesn't always see it happen.

_(But that moment never came.)_

But the judgment,

_(Dumbledore looked into his eyes for a long time, too long--)_

the look of sentence being passed,

_(Severus could hear a rushing in his ears, as though he were staring into the Dark Lord's eyes instead-- )_

is always there,

_(but then he let go his shoulder, dropped his gaze, and left him standing, straight and proud and alone, there before his desk. "Well, Severus," he said, sitting down. "What shall we do with you?")_

if he looks for it.

_("Whatever you need, sir." Severus finally let his shoulders droop, let himself shiver. He told himself it was cold he felt, and not disappointment.)_

The drumming of the hoofbeats does not slow, does not fade.

_("Severus. Oh, my dear boy.")_ He stares up at Albus's face, waiting for the shift in his blue eyes-- only the smallest change, a glint, a spark. Albus is reaching for him; he flinches-- and there it is, a sudden sadness in his eyes. "Oh, Severus."

The centaurs are standing very still, watching Albus, watching him. They stand very still, but their hooves still pound in Severus's ears.

* * *

_xi.) ever after_

The pain is gone when Severus wakes, and he lies for a long time without opening his eyes, stretching his limbs in turn and feeling their wholeness. He must have woken before-- he remembers pain, and noise, and Albus looking down at him, frowning, worried-- but how much is memory and how much dream, he cannot tell.

It is daylight. The hospital wing is empty. Severus must not be badly hurt, if he's been left alone. He looks up at the ceiling and wonders if he could stand up, if he could walk back to his own rooms. He's almost convinced himself to try it, when he hears the hoofbeats.

They start far down the corridor, ringing loud against the flagstones, and their echoes roll and tumble between the bare stone walls, swelling the four slow steady footfalls into a clattering thousand. At once, Severus is rigid, a chill sweat springing on his forehead.

The hoofbeats draw near, slower and slower, and finally stop, just outside the door. He knows it's only Firenze, Firenze whom he does not fear, Firenze who had kissed him with such eager sweetness, stilling the trembling of his lips against Severus's mouth. Severus tries to school his breathing, to unclench his fingers from the sheets, but he still lies frozen, his breath racing, even when the echoes have faded away.

Firenze stands a long time outside the door, silent, before Severus hears a soft footfall and the rustle of robes.

"Headmaster."

"Professor Firenze. I can return later if you--"

"No!" More quietly-- Severus strains to hear-- Firenze continues, "There is no need, Headmaster. But, tell me, how is Professor Snape?"

"His injuries have been healed. As for the hurts to his mind-- well. That may take time." Albus's voice is weary, stretched; Severus wonders how long he sat by his bedside. "Firenze. I am sure Severus does not hold you responsible. He will need the support of those he cares for. Will you not--"

"Headmaster." There's a faint, high-pitched scrape-- a hoof scuffing on the flagstones. Severus's hands clench again. His heart is racing-- Albus will send Firenze in to him any moment now-- and his pulse in his ears resounds like hoofbeats, almost drowns out Firenze's next words.

Almost. "I fear you misunderstand the nature of our... my relationship with Professor Snape is-- amicable, certainly-- but it is largely based in mutual curiosity." Severus swallows; his mouth is suddenly bitter. He wonders if Albus could hear how Firenze's voice stumbled, and then wonders if he simply imagined it.

"I see." No, no, Albus must have heard; must be frowning through narrowed eyes as he lets the silence drag on. "Yes, I recall that you have a long-standing fascination with all things human. If I--" a weighty pause-- "have misinterpreted your interest, then I apologize."

Severus's head still pounds, with hoofbeats or with the thrum of his own heart, he cannot tell. In his mind's eye, Firenze looks down, abashed; in his mind, Firenze is ashamed to meet Dumbledore's eyes, ashamed of his cowardice. And yet it helps, to know Firenze for a coward: for Severus knows he could not face the centaur without fear, knows he would shrink from his touch.

"If you hold him in such regard, Headmaster, then it is for you to-- " And perhaps Severus imagines the defeat in Firenze's voice, as he trails off. "I will not detain you," he says, quietly, and his hooves ring against the floor.

"Firenze!" The hoofbeats stop; echoes ripple down the hall. "I do regard him," Albus says, "very highly indeed."

The hoofbeats clatter on, sounding suddenly louder as the door opens; Severus is still shaking when Albus pulls a chair up to his bedside.

"You gave us a scare, Severus," he says, smiling. "Young Draco and I had quite the adventure, retrieving you from the forest." The sound of hooves still rings, in the air, in Severus's ears. "But you're going to be fine, Severus."

Albus's kindly blue eyes are steady and sad. Any moment now, they will shift. The hooves still beat against his ears, and any moment now, someone else will look down at him through Albus's eyes. Any moment, but not just yet-- no, first Albus reaches out, lays his hand on Severus's trembling shoulder. Severus twists, his body trying to throw off the gentle touch, but Albus doesn't let go; he lets his hand grow heavy, pressing him back against the pillows, quieting the tremors that still shake him.

His eyes are still kind. His hand is heavy and still on Severus's shoulder. Hoofbeats still sound beneath his voice, as he says, "I have you, Severus. I won't let you go." Soon, soon, his eyes will change, but they are still soft and knowing and kind as he raises one white hand and gently, gently, brushes Severus's sweat-damp hair from his brow.

* * *

_"Sheep in Fog"  
Sylvia Plath_

The hills step off into whiteness.  
People or stars  
Regard me sadly, I disappoint them.

The train leaves a line of breath.   
O slow  
Horse the colour of rust,

Hooves, dolorous bells ----  
All morning the  
Morning has been blackening,

A flower left out.   
My bones hold a stillness, the far  
Fields melt my heart.

They threaten  
To let me through to a heaven  
Starless and fatherless, a dark water.


End file.
